Sterling Bank launches three well-coordinated new websites that support its major re-branding initiative

An approach grounded in customer experience helps Sterling Bank launch three well-coordinated new websites that support its major re-branding initiative

Sterling Bank is the largest commercial bank headquartered in Washington State and one of the largest regional community banks in the western United States. As the leading community bank in the Pacific Northwest, Sterling Bank’s service culture is based on relationship banking.

A compelling, competitive online presence.
As the economy emerged from recession, Sterling Bank undertook a major re-branding effort. As part of that initiative, the institution wanted to extend its brand strategy into public-facing digital channels:

Sterling Bank’s objectives included:

Improving brand consistency across all digital channels

Enhancing user experience

Adding mobile web accessibility— something the bank lacked even though it knew that close to 10 percent of traffic came from smart phones and other mobile devices

Improving the back-end design and technical implementation to allow the bank’s marketing team to manage web content without support from the web hosting vendor

Developing a new web presence for the bank’s commercial lending subsidiary, Intervest Mortgage

The right combination of experience.
For assistance, Sterling Bank turned to West Monroe Partners, which offered an approach to website design and implementation grounded in customer experience. Moreover, West Monroe Partners backed up this approach with deep banking industry experience and established technical and project management skills that enabled it to manage the project efficiently across multiple vendors—from a design agency to back-end technical vendors.

Support from design to deployment. West Monroe Partners worked with Sterling Bank to address all facets of the program—from design to development to migration to the new web platform.

To design all elements of Sterling Bank’s digital presence, West Monroe Partners:

Conducted a full review of all current digital channels, including a customer experience heuristic assessment of the bank’s website

Reviewed web and cross-channel analytics to develop a baseline of current customer experience

Facilitated workshops with the bank and its agency partner to define a vision for online brand experience

Built business and customer personas and future-state customer journey maps to guide the design process

Designed wireframes and defined the functional and technical requirements for the new site—based on customer experience goals

Collaborated with the bank’s branding agency to ensure that the designs brought customers experience goals to life and were consistent with re-branding goals

Then, with strong, customer-focused designs in hand, West Monroe Partners led development of the new sites and mobile application—managing the effort across numerous vendors. Finally, West Monroe configured migration to the new content management platform and developed the custom code required to enable the new designs.